THE RIDE by Thien Thach — Fiction Memoir written in 1983.
(This is a personal fiction memoir, not intended to alienate anyone but to convey emotional experience).
It was a hot and humid summer day in May 1983. After a heart-pounding and nerve-racking After a journey through a dense jungle where a landmine was knowingly placed, I finally reached Nong Chan.
Nong Chan was located right on the tip of the Cambodia-Thailand border, south-west of Thailand, and central-east of Cambodia. Nong Chan was also known as a war zone between the Cambodian factions,
In Nong Chan refugee camp, there was a medical clinic operated by ICRC (International Committee of the Red Cross). The Red Cross sign was distinctly seen from a distance, because it was placed on top of a hut; there was a huge Red Cross emblem on it. I felt a great relief as I spotted an ICRC worker inside the clinic.
I entered the clinic and reported to Dominique, an ICRC worker from Switzerland, that I was an escapee from Communist Vietnam. Dominique’s assistant, Mr. Kong, a Chinese interpreter who could speak Vietnamese and English both with a thick Cantonese accent, gave me a pen to write my name, time and date of arrival on a notebook.
I was then given a plastic bowl and spoon, a blanket, and a mat, then led to a large bamboo hut right behind the clinic.
Before entering the bamboo hut, Kong led me to meet Mr. Dang, a former colonel of the Republic of Vietnam, who was a liaison between the Vietnamese refugees and the ICRC.
“This is it! You’re being stuck here like the rest of us,” Mr. Dang announced as he was walking me in.
I was totally puzzled by the words “stuck” and “us,” but it immediately answered once I saw a dozen men and women sadly and hopelessly sitting on their mats on the ground as if they were waiting for a miracle.
Pointing at an empty hollow space, Mr. Dang said, “Pick your spot. Wherever you prefer.” I was completely shocked, but I didn’t dare to show it.
Still trembling by the terrifying journey and by the death of my younger brother, who did not make it to the destination, I was now stuck in this place, facing new fears and uncertainties. It was a “brave lion that was helplessly entrapped in a cage.” A pair of mighty wings of a fearless eagle could no longer spread.”
I became sicker, despairing, fearful, and hopeless to have known that I was in RIP house –a Refugee Initial Project house run by the ICRC.
RIP was nothing but a big public open space. Its size was 10x30 meters. It was economically made of durable bamboo materials, and thatch leaves covered its roof. At one point, RIP housed up to 1804 (according to the United States General Accounting Office).
To ease the despair, I comforted myself by considering that RIP was my actual "hotel," a hotel with no beds. Every night, I went to ground instead.
RIP was built in such a thoughtful way that at night I could see million of stars mysteriously twinkling in the sky through the open gaps of the bamboo walls. In such a thoughtful design, RIP deserved a special rating —a million-star hotel.
RIP’s population grew fast as the daily new arrivals of Vietnamese refugees from other parts of Thailand.
To accommodate the rapid growth, RIP expanded, first doubling, then tripling in its size. A kind of community bunk bed was consequently invented- 50-60 persons per bed. We each had a coffin- 3x6 foot space. Some chose to dwell on the ground; others preferred the bunk bed.
Living in the RIP was like living in a beehive – noises of people talking, chatting, arguing, laughing, singing, crying, farting, moaning, and of course fucking from all directions. All these actually didn't bother me as much, with the exception of the singing voice of a guy on my distant left.
Everyevening, I would have to endure his odious, unsophisticated, rising, falling, and shrieking voice. His butt-cracking voice drove me absolutely nuts.
I loathed his voice, his country song, and the crude and non-poetic lyrics. Nevertheless, there was no way I could escape from it.
There was nothing to do in RIP. Every day was just another day of boredom, despair, and fear by the randomly raided and artillery shelled in by the VC on the other side of the border, and the fear ofrepatriation by the Thai government.
I began to find a variety of ways to cope with this passive insanity.
The phases went from the state of hibernation, of observation, of recollection, of enlightenment, and of acceptance.
The state of hibernation was to deal with the grief and the despair. There was no better way than that of hibernation, because every time I woke up I was glad to have passed another second, minute, hour, and day of mental and physical endurance: the insane noise of the different kinds of people; the inhumanely abusive nature of Thai soldiers who employed a so-called “Human deterrence” approach –a method by which it randomly lined its 1804 residents up and whacked them one person at a time.
The merciless agony of the tropical heat; and the unpleasant smell from a collection of as many as 1804 human waste (!), fifty yards away. My state of hibernation could merely last for 2 weeks, because my body could no longer tolerate the sleeping.
It therefore made it to the end of the hibernation, which led to a new state, the state of observation.
I began to observe my surroundings and the human behaviors in this confined environment. At first, there was a most noticeable group of Roman Catholics, very private, and exclusively well fed on my left-end. They ate well, prayed well, and were pretty grateful for their meals, private food supplies from Rome, and the privilege of a religious affiliation to the West.
The next group on my extreme-right was a group of Muslims, who were the Chams - the indigenous people who'd once owned most of central Vietnam. I did not record how many times they prayed a day, but I was painfully burned out by seeing them praying every time I turned to my right.
The difference between their practice and my hibernation was that mine was sort of passive-inactive; and theirs was passive-active, or a kind of awaking hibernation.
Across from my ground-bed was a humble Buddhist monk whose daily meal was very simple,rice, bananas, and water, which were often offered by Buddhist followers. His meal to me was luxurious, but I was not sure he actually realized that, or whether he maybe thought of nothing at all.
An interesting thing about this monk was that he did all things in a world of slow motion –scratching, talking, walking, eating, farting too –perhaps, and humbly and quietly chanting his KARMA SUTRA.
Watching his world of slow motion, I couldn't stop wondering how he would manage a bad diarrhea —in slow mo?
The rest of us, I guess, were the atheists who mostly lived a life by animal instincts –neither having religious guidance nor teaching principles to abide by.
After a couple of months of my extensive observations, I classified four types of people in the RIP. They were the good, the bad, the sick, and the ugly.
The good were the mentally or physically disabled, or both. They were, of course.
extremely honest, saying what they felt, asking for what they wanted. Some fortunately left the country.
along with their families; others mysteriously managed to get out of the country by themselves.
Being mentally, physically disabled, or both. They were especially provided with extra care by the International Red Cross (IRC) – plenty of food and medical care.
The bad, on the other hand, were the ones that devoured the disabled. They actually volunteered to take care of the disabled, which they normally wouldn't do, because by doing so, they could take advantage of the extra food and medical supplies, then sell them to the black market, within the RIP.
The sick were those who arrived at the camp with either existing illnesses or newly developing ones. The sick usually blamed others for their worsening conditions. As a result, they got sicker. The sicker they became, the better care they received. The question was “Who wouldn't want to be sick?”
Finally, the ugly were the most memorable. They devoured all. They devoured the good, the bad, the sick, and among the ugly themselves. They would do anything to win. They would steal, lie, and cheat; they would do a blowjob for a penny, and would have their ass fucked in order to be fed.
I became so fed up with all these. I sat desolately on a peak of Mt. Everest watching the magnificent sunrise and sunset; I eventually lived life internally. I thought of all the fond memories –the giggles I received from a joke; the sharing my beat-up guitar with the neighbor kids; the frequent chasing after pretty girls on a bike, and the coconut peels by the teeth contests.
These were fun and wonderful but not as resonating as the love I first had. I recalled my falling in love with Xuan-Thi, who was a breathtakingly beautiful middle school girl. I recalled her proud, beautiful, long dark brown hair, her exquisitely pretty face, and her choice of outfits—tailored to the times of day and seasons of the year. All of these always inspired my poetry.
I was also fond of the enthralling moments when I caught her bright, clear brown eyes fixating on me. From a distance, I could smell the sensual feminine scent of her breaths, the lyrical fragrance of her long thin hair, and the elating moments of our timidly exchanging love letters.
I worshiped this pristine, innocent, emotional kind of love that was without physical contact –the poignant numbness of our longing but speechless, and the thrilling elation when we were within our reach.
Then there was a night, a very unforgettable night, a night from which my youthful lips were lustfully about to meet hers. It was right there, right at this very moment, the moment of earthly desire - highly, physically, and emotionally charged.
It was it!
It finally arrived!
It was full of anticipation. It centered on only one focal point, a point of passion, of love, and of lust. That was it!
That was the moment of fleshly truth!
That was the moment of dramatic revelation!
It got me good!
It got me hard! It got me forever!
It got me as surprisingly as shockingly as unexpectedly as unpleasantly as painfully as nastily as
miserably as dramatically as bitterly as …G...O...S...H… Who would imagine she turned out to be
a………………………………………………………….dude!
I remembered that night walking home in the rain —devasted…
I went on recalling a very unique character of one of the classmates, who was a semi-layman and a semi-Buddhist monk. Because of his confused and undetermined social status, the school granted him an exception to its strict white-on-blue uniform policy.
So he was especially allowed to dress either a white-on-blue uniform or the dark-brown attire of a Buddhist monk. Because of his Buddhist attire and a Buddhist skinhead style, in a crowd, he was distinctly seen.
He talked a lot, but most of his talk was nonsense! When he talked, one had to remember to carry a bulletproof vest, because he would heartlessly spray the bullet-spit all over.
In addition, he loved to chase after girls - being a Buddhist monk, he wasn't supposed to, but he did it anyway. He did not chase just any girl, but the prettiest ones. When he picked his target, she would surely be famous! Compulsive, talkative, skinned-head, and trans-attired, someone among the students cruelly came up with a nickname for him, "SHIT", for Skinned Head In Trans-attire.
One day, a couple of classmates and I were hanging out at a coffee shop near the school. There was Shit, cruising his bike around looking for free cigarettes. Seeing us, Shit started to talk to us from a distance. When Shit joined our group, he would, of course, do all the talking. It seemed never-ending.
When things went out of control, none of us could endure the endless nonsense, and his bullets, one of us complained. "Hey dude, you talk too much. Would you mind stopping for a moment? We need to talk, too."
Shit glanced at a pack of cigarettes on the table, very tempting.
Shit: "Sorry dude, I am the one who possesses an endless train of thoughts."
Shit threw a giggle and continued, "I therefore obligate to share with you all."
"Prove it! Prove to us that you possess the endless train of thoughts."
The same guy now became the challenger, challenging Shit.
Shit: "Try me, anything. I will come up with answers." Shit proudly took the challenge.
Challenger: "Do you have a girlfriend?"
Shit: "No! I don't."
Challenger: "How so? An articulate guy like you, conquering all the prettiest girls in the school, yet
having no girlfriends?"
The challenger turned to look at us for an agreement.
"Nope!" Very amusing, Shit replied.
Challenger: "What do you do when you want sex?"
Shit paused for a moment, struggling to hold his mean giggle.
Shit: "I'm...m…m...meditating!"
We all, of course, laughed at his comedic trick in making us anticipate
"masturbating…”
Challenger: "What is it so good about meditation?"
Shit: "Well, you know, it makes me feel good…. smooth… and peaceful."
Challenger: "Are you feeling good, smooth, and peaceful now?"
Shit: "Uh…relatively."
Challenger: "What do you mean relatively? You've got to be a little more specific.”
Shit: "I mean relatively. It just means… relatively!"
Challenger: "In which ways though…because it doesn’t make sense, otherwise."
Shit: "Dude! It doesn't need to make sense. It just means not absolute!"
Challenger: "I know, but it is still, in which ways though."
Shit: "Ah! You don't understand all about it. Big brains don't talk specifically; they talk about
grand um…I mean, grand ideas."
Challenger: "Grand ideas? By saying that, you mean you are one of the geniuses?"
Shit: "Yep!" holding on to his giggle.
Challenger: "Can you name one of your grand ideas?"
Shit held on to his thought until we ran out of patience.
Shit: "The theory of Relativity!"
Challenger: "What? That was Einstein's. Wasn't it?"
Shit: "Nope! It was mine." Shit eyed the cigarette pack again, very tempting.
Challenger: "Bull…"
Shit: "Yeah, I said it. I said it many times before Einstein did.” Shit looked at us, challenging.
Challenger: "Any formula to back up your claim of the “theory of relativity?"
Shit: "Dude, I don't need any formulas, because it will leave the rest for you to figure it out on your own. If you couldn’t, you knew you weren't smart."
Shit was very pleasing with his response.
The challenger turned to us as if he was saying –"WTF!"
Challenger: "Ok…you got me on that. Tell us what's next in your mind?"
It went on and on, testing his endless train of thought by repeating the same phrase, “What's next in your mind?’
After a series of rapid ‘what's next’ questions, Shit's brain began to run out of juice.
Shit: "About what?"
Challenger: "About what’s next in your mind."
Shit: "Dude, I can't give you an answer without a question," paused and giggled, he continued,
“But what was your question anyway?"
He made another ridiculous giggle.
Challenger: "The question was that ‘what’s next in your mind,’ at this very moment."
Shit's binary brain couldn't come up with a quick response. His eyes stealthily glanced at the open cigarette pack on the table.
This was surely an ideal moment for a free cigarette without having to ask for it.
Shit: "OK, it was my mind telling me to grab the cigarette pack."
The guy who owned the cigarette pack stared at him unpleasantly.
Challenger: "Alright, then what?"
Shit: "Then I take a cigarette out of it."
Shit slowly and irritatingly pulled out a cigarette, since he knew we were watching.
Challenger: "Hey, I thought you didn't smoke."
Shit: "Who said I didn't smoke? I always do."
Challenger: "But I've never seen you smoke before."
Holding hard to his mean giggle.
Shit: "Yes, I smoke only if it isn't at my own expense!"
Challenger: "What? Why so?"
Shit: "Why? Because it feels good to send somebody's dolls into smoke!"
Challenger: "So what do you save the money for?"
Shit: "For things… you know… things…I don't want to buy!"
Challenger: "What? What things that you don't want to buy?”
Shit: "Cigarettes!" Shit giggled in delight.
Challenger: "Oh, I thought you said you wouldn't spend your money on cigarettes."
Shit: "I don't! As I said, I only smoke at someone's expense."
He threw another ridiculous giggle, studying our reactions.
Challenger: "Ok, what's next?"
Shit: "Then I light it up." Shit slowly lit the cigarette.
Challenger: "I can see that. Then what?"
Shit: "I inhale it!"
Shit fed the cigarette into his mouth, gripped its butt in his front teeth, and took a long
revengeful puff.
The challenger became very impatient.
Challenger: "You've inhaled it, then what?”
Shit couldn't wait to answer; he burst out in choking.
Shit: "Dude," struggling to breathe, "I need an exhalation,” coughing, “…before I
could answer you. Don't you see it, stupid?"
We all burst out laughing at his shrewd ending, as he was coughing uncontrollably. At the same time, we saw the cigarette smoke was coming out both from his mouth and nostrils.
My recollection was to this point also out of juice. I started looking for another alternative therapy, attempting to turn the chaotic reality into some sort of a layman's joyous experience. I started to seek something new, something full of hope and refreshing.
I learnt there was a rumor saying that Thailand and 15 countries were negotiating about our fate, how they would re-settle us into a safety zone under Thailand’s legal protections.
The Thai government, however, demanded that the RIP residents must move somewhere else, not in Thailand. This rumor had not moved me, because there was a rumor almost every day. I therefore sought a new way to entertain myself.
RIP nightly curfew policy was at 10PM. Before the curfew, the atheists and the weeders (ones who smoked weed), who considered themselves “gods of happiness” - circled around chatting all different things, essentially to ease the hopelessness. I'd previously declined the invitations, but this time, well, I accepted.
That was a nightly routine of the gods of happiness sitting around a tiny homemade vegetable-oil lamp. Next to the lamp was a 4"x6" pretty well-crafted dark-brown hard cover with a very fine golden print on which it was titled "HOLLY BIBLE." One of the happy gods somehow got it from a Christian Missionary who visited the camp a few days ago.
I was surprised by the weeders for the way they treated the Holly Bible in such great care. I never asked, however.
Next to the Holly Bible was a zip bag of weed. It was De's, a veteran weeder and his gods who'd rather smoke than eat, trading in their weekly two tuna cans for weed with a local Thai.
Under the gentle flicking light of a homemade lamp, De's acne-face became more mysterious as he was wrapping a roll of weed in a very fine, soft white piece of paper.
Before De lit the roll, he proudly exclaimed: "I am the veteran weeder; I therefore get the privilege to open its virginity."
De handed the roll to me after a few long puffs. "Now it is your turn to try it out. I can guarantee with you that it is the best way to escape this freaking reality." I stared at him, full of doubt.
"Trust me on this. You will not be disappointed. It is, in fact, heaven on earth!" De insisted.
So I did a few puffs, then I passed it to the next guy. The roll went on circling around. After a few rounds, I became impatiently seeking the heavenly feelings as De described.
"Dude, I don't feel anything!" I complained.
"Don't worry, you'll be there," De laughed and affirmed.
I impatiently grabbed a handful of weed in the zip bag and a piece of very fine soft white paper, the same page that ripped earlier from the Holly Bible.
I firmly rolled it to a size of my thumb. I lit it and rapidly puffed. The delightful glow of the fireball, with its tip, interestingly captured my attention. I began to enjoy the glittering glow and the burst-cracking sound of the seeds from the fireball at the tip.
Shortly, my eyelids grew heavier. They shut momentarily. I was surprisingly stunned by the multiple spectrum of colors, rapidly and randomly spinning, whirling, and wildly dancing in my eyes. I was unceasingly laughing.
Wow! It is a phenomenon!. It unbelievably went beyond my imagination.
"See. I told you." De merrily sounded.
"Now you are convinced, huh?"
I could barely hear him saying it, because I was focusing on the activities of my eardrums –stretching, expanding, slowly zooming, and increasing their volume. I was gradually hearing a distinctively loud, crystal, very pleasant, and melodic voice of a man singing an incredibly enchanting country song from my distant left. The lyrics were so simplistic, yet romantically, engrossingly, and beautifully moving.
His majestic voice (gosh!), it must have been definitely a voice of god, was so absorbing that every element of my blood cells altogether was thrilling and ejaculating –endlessly.
The lyrics moreover so deep and profoundly charged that I could do nothing but become wholeheartedly fallen in love with it -the country song, the simplistic yet beautiful lyrics, the sound of godly romance, the dreamy rhythms, and the majestic voice of god. Life suddenly became meaningful, lovely, and hopeful. I couldn't disagree more with the claims of the gods of happiness, because at this very moment, I had become one, myself.
After the ongoing observations over the weedy activities, I’d learned that weed could be a lot of fun, laughter, and happiness for many, but also very paranoid for some.
After Ty got high, for instance, he would cling tightly to the ground. It was like the Spiderman crawling on a wall to protect him from falling, because he felt that the earth was rapidly tilting.
Lam, another experiment weeder, became so panicky after a few puffs. Because he terribly experienced feeling no "heartbeats!" His panicky facial expression was extremely bizarre and contagious, which took us good tricks to convince him that it was just an illusion.
Nam shared his great sense of guilt, "Bible is to read, not to consume!" He repeatedly said it to anyone who bumped into him. He'd once sworn that he had seen and experienced the bible text glowing on his skin. While being high, in a comic way, he showed his lower left arm and read aloud, “Chapter 11. If thou are to commit a sin, thou shall go to hell."
We all, of course, laughed at his illustration of the illusion. The next day, Nam confessed he hardly slept last night because he felt a dense layer of Bible papers stacked on his back like fish scales. He was reportedly so fearful in having thought that God was coming to punish him right on his very back.
Finally, also hilariously, there was an extremely but strangely case of two other guys, Luong and Kha. Once Luong, a slim and quiet person, got high, he organically felt a constant thrust from the muscles of his stomach, forcefully squeezing upward. As a result, he felt like throwing up the whole night.
Kha, a big and tall –so tall that he always bent his back as he walked so it would give the impression that he was shorter than he really was- organically experienced a similar constant thrust from the muscles of his stomach, forcefully squeezing. His was, however, in a different direction –not upward but downward. As a result, he felt like... shitting the whole night!
Wait! It did not just end there because without seeing him, or hearing his voice within RIP’s parameter, he was surely in the... shit-house —squeezing…
Reality to me after all these was the moment of discovery, joy, fun, pain, suffering, despair, longing, and that of struggling, and the rise and fall of life was indeed a part of human nature. Though, there was no closure to any of the above five states of experiences, it had however, taught me to appreciate every moment of my being, preciously.
After 19 months, and a series of negotiations between Thai and 15 countries that were willing to accept the RIP residents. We each went through extensive interviews by the 15 countries' immigration; each had its own criteria. They would admit only those who met their immigration policies.
In the beginning of January 1983, Canadian Immigration granted me an interview. It turned me down because I didn’t have any skills. It was followed by the Austrian, which also turned me down because I didn’t come with a large family.
The following day, my name was called up by the INS of the United States of America. After an intensive interview, along with a simple question, yet very hard to answer. The question was “Why did you leave Vietnam?”
RIP residents finally resettled all over the world: England, France, Austria, Netherlands, Norway, Germany, Switzerland, New Zealand, Japan, Australia, Malaysia, and the United States.
A happy ending, I guessed, because China, North Korea, Eastern Europe, and the Soviet Union were not among them.
As far as my brother's concern, I would prefer not to talk or think about it. I would, however, hope that someday I would have the courage to face the painful truth and return to the location searching for his remains.